New developments on the Shadowbane front include a new interview with a producer of this MMORPG at GameSpy and info on a "beta event" on the main web site. The Q&A talks with executive producer Scott Harrington about this upcoming game from Wolfpack Studios and UbiSoft, as well as getting into the current status of the beta.

The private beta of the game has been officially active for a number of months, with nearly 600 players in the Shadowbane world now. Many more thousands are expected to be entered in testing this summer as they ramp up towards release. Here's an interesting clip from the interview about characters actually being allowed to build structures and cities in the game:

GameSpy: Can you build things in the game, like castles? How is this done?

Scott Herrington: Yup, building cities and castles is in the upper-level gameplay. We do this to get people off the traditional leveling treadmill and into the more social aspects of the game while still rewarding them for being aggressive and conquering other player's cities.

Building a city takes a group of people working together, as the wealth it would take to build and run a city is out of reach of any individual player. For most people, they'll start their city building with a seed for a tree of life. That tree of life will give the guild members a place to bind, and will also help the buildings that they build heal faster if they're damaged in an attack.

After that, the group will probably buy charters to build different structures that they think would be useful. Things like a metal smith's forge, for example, would be high on the list of necessities for a guild of warriors. A wizard's temple though, might be the first thing a guild based on schools of magic would build.

After that, it's really up to the members of the guild. They can continue to build shops, reinforcements like walls and turrets, or even siege weapons to defend their realm.

For more information on what Shadowbane is all about, head over and check out GameSpy's interview now.

In other Shadowbane news, the official web site has word on a beta event which took place last Wednesday night. It seems they are looking to start laying down the world's historical context for the players, as witnessed by the introduction. Here's a quick clip:

Last Wednesday, the Closed Beta testers had their first encounter with history. The mighty Nandramiel, the Archon of Judgment, descended down from the heavens to deliver a message to the adventurers of Aerynth.